


Priority Queue

by Svynakee



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: AU???, Angst, Drabble, TW: Suicide, connor alternate deviant scene, it's the russian roulette chapter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-21
Updated: 2018-06-21
Packaged: 2019-05-26 09:08:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14997536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Svynakee/pseuds/Svynakee
Summary: Connor goes to say farewell to the former Lieutenant Anderson as he prepares to face Markus on the battlefield. But even though androids can't feel pain, he finds saying goodbye more difficult than anticipated.





	Priority Queue

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this in like 20min i just wanted to lol

‘Go on, complete your mission, since that’s all you care about,’ Hank tells him. The man goes back to staring at the photo of his son. The gun is so close. Connor doesn’t know how long he plans to continue his game. With every spin of the chamber, his chance of survival falls…

The rain patters against the roof, muffled by the snow. Hank hasn’t bothered to turn on the heating. Or maybe he’d wanted the cold. The chill doesn’t bother Connor. He wonders how long Hank had sat here before he arrived. How far the chill has gotten into his bones.

Hank has no LED, so stress level for him to scan. The man looks calm now, if melancholy. He stares at the picture with eyes that look out beyond the screen and into the past. There’s something almost tender about his wistful gaze. Gone is the fire, that anger that sparks whenever he looks at Connor. Gone is the ice, the walls he’s built up behind his gruffness. It makes him look empty, as if the Hank he’d worked with these past few days has been deactivated to leave the man’s likeness sitting at the table.

Connor wonders what else he can say. If there’s anything left for him to say. Whether he succeeds in stopping the violent android revolution or not, this will be goodbye – his trial period has ended. Hank is no longer part of the DPD. This partnership is over.

There’s no investigation, no _need_ for Hank Anderson.

And yet Connor stands there.

Time is running out. Even now Markus could be launching an attack against the humans.

Connor doesn’t move.

Markus would lead the attack himself, he’d be exposed, vulnerable-

His feet remain rooted to the wooden floor, he doesn’t, he needs, Lieutenant- no, Hank, just Hank, this is goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.

‘GET OUTTA HERE!’ Hank roared, snapped Connor back to alertness. It’s an order. As a machine, he must obey.

He turns away from the man, the table, the gun.

_Why do I think this matters?_

He takes a step, then another.

_Why am I so reluctant to leave him?_

He’s out of the kitchen now. The living room is dark, and even colder.

_All humans die. The life of one man… should not matter… one old man… jobless, childless… the value of…_

There’s a small sound. Like the scrape of a gun’s barrel as its picked up by an unsteady hand.

_…the value of one life is equal to what I assign to it._

**MISSION: NEUTRALISE DEVIANT LEADER.**

Connor takes another step away from Hank, another step closer to the door.

_Query: the consequences of disobeying CyberLife?_

**MISSION: STOP DEVIANT UPRISING.**

Connor pauses.

_Projection: if I leave and do nothing, Hank Anderson will commit suicide._

**INFORMATION UPDATE: MARKUS HAS BEEN SIGHTED. CURRENTLY ATTACKING ANDROID DESTRUCTION CAMP. SITUATION UNCERTAIN. DEVIANTS ARMED.**

_If I fail, I will be destroyed._

_But_

_what is the worth_

_of an RK800_

_of Connor_

_without_

_Hank?_

Connor gasps as red flashes across his vision. The programming pulling him towards the door shatters; he stumbles. But there’s no time to consider what he’s done, what he plans not to do, because he’s turned and he’s running and Hank has the gun to his head and Connor shouts, ‘STOP!’

The man stares at him in shock. Connor’s by his side now, pulling his arm down and taking the gun from him. Words are falling from his lips and he doesn’t know whether they’re coming from some jumbled protocol trying to fill in the silence or from him, the deviant, the _deviant RK800 prototype._

‘Please, don’t do this, Hank I’m so sorry, I won’t leave, I’d don’t care about the mission, I’ve never cared, it was just my function it was just my programming it wasn’t _me._ ’

Hank brushes a thumb – warm, the way only living human flesh could be – against Connor’s cheek. It comes away wet. For the first time since they’d met, Hank smiles at Connor. It's only a little one, the slightest upward turn of his mouth. But his eyes. There's no fire and there's no ice but they're not empty either, they're warm. They're sunshine, melting away the chill as he takes Connor's trembling hands in his own. Quietly, he asks, ‘Then what do you care about?’

Connor blinks. The tears in his eyes fall. The room looks clearer.

‘I care about… you.’

**Author's Note:**

> and then markus fires the dirty bomb and everything goes to shit
> 
> Honestly I have had the biggest writer's block, just publishing something for this fandom finally instead of trying to wrangle the timeline is a fun _deviation_.


End file.
